This is what it looked like at 7am this morning. We had thunderstorms yesterday that turned into freezing rain! I laid in bed and heard in hit my windows in my bedroom (which now have a nice sheet of ice on the top part!).It has now turned into falling ice! The reports that are out and about said it now hurts when it hits your skin. Em is home today, of course, and when I looked at the weather forecast, there is no way I would be insane enough to try to drive to work. We are talking 2+ hours just to drive there, and then I would have to come home, which this afternoon they are predicting at least 6 to 10 inches of snow!!! It is now 21 degrees outside now, but with the wind chill it is 12 degrees.. and dropping. They said it will drop below 19 degrees outside. It is supposed to snow on through the day and night.They said we are going to have thunder snow! Never had that before. The visibility will be greatly diminished, like 1/2 mile or less. The crews putting out salt on the roads said it is sleeting faster than they can put the salt out so the sleet is covering up what they are doing.

I will probably have more later since I have time to sew, etc today. I think for right now I am going to go make some hot chocolate!!! Hopefully there will be no power outages!

Yes, Yes, Yes, it is finally almost here! The 25 Days of Christmas on the ABC Family Channel. OMG.. all the wonderful movies we loved as children and our children cannot wait to see (and secretly, neither can we). There is Frosty's Winter Wonderland, The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus, The Year without a Santa Claus, etc. They are even going to put on Mary Poppins. Now, for all you adults, you will notice something when you go to their site. There is an add for the Honda Odyssey mini van. Kind of funny and well, disturbing in a way. It states "Go Road Trippin'" and there are yellow and purple mushrooms swaying back and forth...kind of Willy Wonka meets Alice in Wonderland. So, what are they trying to say?

Em went to a birthday party for my friend's daughter Meagan. It was so cute. It was at My Little Dollhouse. They let the girls get all dressed up, did their hair, put on glitter makeup and painted their fingernails. There was a doll house, the cotton candy castle, a princess Jupiter Jump, a cool black light room... all kinds of stuff. They had a fashion show and dance lessons. It was really neat for the girls to get to do this. Thank you Glenna!Yeah, this place is totally girly!
and yes, this is my child.. can she have more hair? Man, could she do that Princess Liea thing or what? When I took her hair down last night there was a total of 25 bobby pins in her hair!

Well, tomorrow we will have a high of around 60 and things will go downhill in the afternoon. There is already a winter weather advisory. I gassed up the car today and stopped by grocery store to make sure I have things to make some chili, hot chocolate supplies, frozen pizza, etc. They are predicting sleet and you know what that can do to power lines! We will have thunderstorms in the afternoon when the Arctic front hits our warm stationary front full of moisture. Things could get interesting around here! I am predicting a power outage if the sleet really hits. But I really want it to snow snow snow!!! Just like Miss Alicia Posie.

Wow, I am not sure about everyone else out there.. but I need a vacation from my Thanksgiving Holiday. We had a good time, but I do not feel like I got anything done or very rested.

The picture above is from our walk after Thanksgiving dinner. Em and I took a walk to "walk off" some of that pie we ate. We just went to my parent's house and had dinner. Nothing fancy, but it was very nice.

I have to let some steam off... I am just totally exhausted. I always thought as Emma grew older, things would be easier, but let me tell you totally opposite. I feel like I am just walking behind her picking up all the time. I have got to do something about it. I told her she was going to have to go through ALL of her stuffed animals and get rid of some of them. She just has way too much stuff. I just thought with 5 days off I would be able to get some sewing accomplished, but noooooo. I sewed the lining to one purse and the outside of one purse. That is it. I really really wanted to get so much more finished. I hate it when this happens. I just feel like I have not accomplished anything. Well, I did, sort of.. I accomplished vaccuming my living room 4 times in 5 days (yes, between Em and the next door neighbor's son my floor had to be vaccumed constantly). So, to all you mothers out there... how do you ever get anything finished? Oh yes, and add this.. Emma has had some stomach bug that started on Saturday and has not stopped yet, and I am feeling a little sick myself.

I usually have the tree up the day after Thanksgiving, but have been a little slow this year. It is up and the lights are on (except for that last 1/2 strand that will not come on and now I have to figure out which bulb it is or replace the whole thing.. bummer). No garland or ornaments yet. Hopefully by th end of the week we will have that done.

My friend Nancy did come to visit, the highlight of the 5 days. She brought her son Miles, which I have not seen. He is so adorable and has such a great outgoing personality. It was great to get to visit with them. I met her years ago while I was still in college. I was working for the university extension office at OSU. She was working for University Extension in Tulsa. I made chocolate chip cookies on one of the days she came into the office.. and we have been friends ever since. Good grief that was over 15 years ago, I think. WOW!!!!

Oh... addition.. I guess I did accomplish something. I ordered Em's presents from Santa (American Girl doll, Coconut the dog, Coconut's doghouse and 2 sets of clothes) and ordered my Dad's presents... books from Amazon. We also went to Hancock's today. The McCall's patterns were still .99 cents ending today. I bought over $70 in 18" doll clothes patterns for $5 dollars!!!! Yeah me!! Okay, another, I need time to sew Em's new doll clothes..... Wonder if she can stay the night with Grandma and Grandpa? and just to make sure I can stay in a hotel overnight.. lug my sewing machine and all my patterns already cut out? I need to figure something out.

As you can tell, I finally figured out the whole banner thing. Actually I took the 5 minutes to read to figure it out. What a goof.

Yesterday was Em's Rise and Shine at her elementary school. This time her class led the pledge of Allegiance. It was so cute.

The kids stayed on the bleachers to sing with the rest of the kids. Every time the teachers put the mic in front of Em she made sure she sang loud and proud. Oddly enough, she has a really good voice. But.... you know what happens when children think people are not looking.........
and mom catches it, of course! There was a boy behind her that cried through the whole thing. The boy next to her, Blake, never danced, sang..nothing. They did the "Turkey Pokey" sung to the tune of the "Hokey Pokey". Too cute when they did the "You put your stuffing in, you put your stuffing out, you put your stuffing in and you shake it all about. You do the Turkey Pokey and turn yourself about, that's what it's all about". So cute!

Today I spent cleaning. I actually pulled the grill off of the bottom of the fridge. OMG... I need a housekeeper because some things should just not be seen (kind of like the picture of Em above...lol). I pulled out the pj pants I had cut out last weekend to sew. Ummm, how many have you cut out the fabric incorrectly? Yes, dumb me did that. I was so upset because I loved the robin's egg blue paisley flannel..... sigh.... I sure hope I can find some more. So, I took a break and did these... quilted cardsThey are not finished... but it took my mind off my ruined pj's/fabric.

Everyone have a wonderful Thanksgiving tomorrow and stay safe if you are driving anywhere!

I started to feel pretty bad last week and have just tried to take it easy.. of course we all know how that goes.

I did get some things cut out over the weekend to sew.. just could not find it in me to really sew this weekend. The only thing we did was go see Happy Feet. Terribly cute movie, good push for kiddos on environmental issues. But the music and penguins were too cute. It helps that I love penguins. Emma was equally delighted and we took our next door neighbor with us. She felt a little funny due to so many other high schoolers being there. Man, just give her 10-20 years.. she will realize all those kids that think they are so cool, are well, not soooo cool. Way better to have the complete adoration of a 5 year old that your peers because the 5 year old thinks you are the bomb!

Hopefully this evening I post more.. maybe I will actually have something accomplished. Today was a pre Thanksgiving Luncheon at Em's daycare. Very very good food. I kind of hung around a little late because a little girl at her daycare had a breakdown when her mother left. Lexi is in Em's dancing class, so I let Lexi come sit with me until she felt better. Poor thing. I cannot stand to see a child cry when their mother leaves : ( I am a sucker to stay behind and try to make them feel better.

Tomorrow, Emma and a few other children are leading the school's assembly by doing the Pledge of Allegiance. She worked on it all weekend. She has really done an outstanding job with it. She still has problems with "with liberty and justice for all". It comes out "with livery and justice for all." Betcha did not know that we all get uniforms and justice according to the Pledge of Allegiance, did you? Yes, I am going, and I am going to film it.

Well, there will be more later. I have quilted cards to sew, sweater bags to finish sewing, Em's pink horse pj's (and matching ones for her American Girl doll that Santa will be delivering), a Em's XMAS dress..... I am sure there is more. Oh, I found a red wool sweater at Goodwill. I felted it and it shrunk up to fit Emma. I have cut it to make a sweater jacket.... I just need to find some trim I really like for the edges... anyone know of any good on line places to look? I cannot find anything around here that I really like.

I have been thinking about this for a while, and I have determined he does have one. Why else would he have written Cell ?

I say this because at any given time on any given day I can walk into the loo (Water closet, head, restroom, bathroom, toilette, potty, whatever you wish to call it) and almost all the stalls are full with women on cell phones. I have even had to wait, while doing the pee pee dance, for these women to finish their conversation so I can potty. I take that back, they never finish the conversation – they flush and keep on talking. I think they end it when they have to wash their hands (at least they still do that). I have heard women talk about court dates, where they are going for lunch, what they are going to pick up for dinner, which store has the best sales going on, and what the drinking plans are for the evening. I have even witnessed a young man walking into the men’s restroom on his phone... we came out of our respective bathrooms about the same time and he was still on the phone. This would lead me to believe he was on the phone the entire time he was, well, you get the point. Can I say eeeewwww?

So—what does this whole phenomenon say about our society as a whole? We are going down the toilet? There are two reasons why I ask this;

How much must the party on the toilet not care to have another person on the phone hear them do their business and flush?

How much must the person on the end of the line not care if they hear that kind of thing?

I am sorry, but I find this disturbing. I mean, do you think the Queen Mum sits in the loo and conducts her business on her phone while tinkling (I hate that word, but it worked, so I am just going to flow with it—oh wait, what’s up with all the potty puns?)? That would give a whole new meaning to her taking her place on the throne.

What is so life threatening that you have to talk about it in a public bathroom, on the potty, doing your business? I have even witnessed people just going in the bathroom just to talk on the phone! There is no “lounge” area in our restroom. It’s not like these people are in a bar and the only quiet place in the building is the bathroom! Thank goodness there is no lounge in our bathrooms; no one would even be able to get into the bathroom then.

And people argue about privacy laws.. sheesh.. I just do not get it. I am sorry if this offends anyone, but you have never seen a 6 stall bathroom full of women just sitting and talking on their cell phones.

Now to the picture at the beginning. Today the high will be 64, which is a good temperature. BUT tomorrow the high will be 47 with rain and, gulp, possible snow! I think we are approaching the end of fall.

P.S. I wonder how many cell phones are injured a year by being dropped in the toilet?

This is what we all felt like around the house by Sunday afternoon.... pooped out. My dad came over to see Emma, and they ended up playing horses and then falling asleep for a quick nap. It was too funny.

I took this picture of this beautiful sugar Maple tree on my way out of the neighborhood on Friday.. before my multiple doctors appointments. I made all of my appointments and then, of course, made my way to Goodwill and to the fabric stores.. what else would you expect on my day off. I need to really take pictures of everything I bought, but of course forgot to before I dove into everything (except I did get a Peter Pan Golden Press book from 1950 for Emma for $1!)

Saturday made the rounds at all of the Antique stores in Claremore. I was quite dissappointed, or maybe I just can never find anything please to my eye. Either way, Miss Alicia, if you moved here and opened a booth, I would be broke and you would rolling in it! LOL She has a way with presentation like none other. The people in Claremore could take a few pointers for you. They have no overall theme, it is like they just buy stuff and then throw it into their booths. No rhyme or reason... oh well. The day wasn't a total wash. I bought 10 old buttons for 98 cents and then two really cool prints, which I will have to show later.

I also did some sewing this weekend. I cut out the following this weekend;

Emma's dress for Christmas, which really need to finish so I can get her in for pictures. I will take a picture of the pattern because it is way 70's but I love it

What I finished sewing;

2 felted sweater bags

pajama bottoms for Emma

Archie

Wool scarf

I am keeping the green felted purse for myself, so I will probably put the other one on Etsy, or I may try my hand at puttin it on my blog site this weekend, along with the scarf above. I made it, and then realized I bought my new coat. I found some more skirts and things to tear apart at Goodwill on Friday, so I may be making a new one for me. More of the caramel, pink and cream colors.... not sure because I found enough wool to make an black wool/red silk one(s) too. We will have to see what the week/weekend brings